Freemium revenues have increased 4x on iOS in 12 months

I’ve been busy adding a lot of new benchmarks and market size statistics to our regularly updated pages. Here’s a quick rundown of all the new data, and links to our pages if you’re hungry for more.

Oh, and I love it when people share data with me. Contact me if you have anything interesting to tell me. Everything here helps other developers to plan their business and sanity check their forecasts using the Free to Play Spreadsheet.

Over the last 24 months, worldwide revenues for freemium apps on iOS have more than quadrupled. In 2012, worldwide freemium revenues on Google Play have grown 3.5X. Premium revenues for both app stores remained relatively flat in these time periods. (source: Appannie)

Superdata research has whales as the top 15% of spending users and dolphins as the next 25-40%. Whales generate 50% of the revenue, while minnows – users who spend between $1 and $5 – generate 15% of a game’s revenue.

I’ve added ESA Canada’s latest report to the Resources page. It highlights audiences and use cases that have often been ignored by the industry:

80% of parent gamers play games with their children

68% of mature gamers (aged 55+) play games most often on a computer

Among young adults, male and female gamers play video games about as often as each other, with 45% of women and 49% of men playing a few days a week. Competitive online RPG play is very popular regardless of gender.

About Zoya Street

I’m responsible for all written content on the site. As a freelance journalist and historian, I write widely on how game design and development have changed in the past, how they will change in the future, and how that relates to society and culture as a whole. I’m working on a crowdfunded book about the Dreamcast, in which I treat three of the game-worlds it hosted as historical places. I also write at Pocketgamer.biz and The Borderhouse.

About

Gamesbrief is a blog about the business of games. We look behind the headlines to tell you not just what is happening to games, but why it matters to your business. From Activision to Zynga, we analyse the companies who are making waves in the games industry and the new platforms, like Facebook, iPhone and Unity, that are changing the market.

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